To Kill a Mockingbird on Broadway

Harper Lee’s Pulitzer Prize-Winning American classic comes to Broadway in a new adaptation by Aaron Sorkin, Directed by Bartlett Sher.

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About To Kill a Mockingbird

Inspired by Lee’s own childhood in Alabama, "To Kill a Mockingbird" features one of literature’s towering symbols of integrity and righteousness in the character of Atticus Finch, based on Lee’s own father. The character of Scout, based on herself, has come to define youthful innocence – and its inevitable loss – for generation after generation of readers around the world.

Published in 1960, Harper Lee’s debut novel "To Kill a Mockingbird" was an immediate and astonishing success. It won the Pulitzer Prize and quickly became a global phenomenon, with more than 50 million copies in print to date. Considered one of the great classics of modern American literature, the novel has never been out of print since its original publication.

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This Pulitzer Prize-winning work by Harper Lee comes to the stage for the first time on Broadway in Aaron Sorkin’s new adaptation of the seminal piece. Set in Alabama during the Great Depression, Jean Louise Finch — known to most as Scout — tells the story of how her father, lawyer Atticus Finch, has been appointed to defend Tom Robinson, a black man undeservedly accused of raping a young white woman. However, Scout and her brother, Jem, are taking the heat for their father’s decision to go through with representing Tom as the trial approaches.

Directed by Bartlett Sher, the classic story exploring justice and tolerance in the American South is brought to Broadway in a newly revised version for 2018 — when the politics of sexual assault and race are making headlines in different ways than they were in the 1930s. As producer Scott Rudin says, “The world has changed since then.”

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What To Watch For

Before she died, novelist Harper Lee agreed to having Aaron Sorkin draft a revised script of “To Kill a Mockingbird” for the stage.

In the new script, Atticus Finch experiences a gradual moral evolution, according to Aaron Sorkin. “As far as Atticus and his virtue goes, this is a different take on Mockingbird than Harper Lee’s or Horton Foote’s,” he said.

Novelist Harper Lee based the character of Atticus Finch on her own father, AC Lee, who worked as a lawyer and defended two African-American men accused of murder.

The book has also been adapted as a play by Christopher Sergel that debuted in 1990 in Lee’s hometown of Monroeville, Ala. This marks the first time Lee’s story is brought to life on Broadway.